Give, When We Can And Ought To

By Roshel

When he read the message on his phone, his first reaction was of intense irritation. He thought the man was taking him for a ride—and that was something that he just hated. The man had mentioned that if he wasn’t able to arrange for a certain sum of money by the weekend, the electricity connection to his home might be cut off. Without saying so in so many words, he was asking him if could send him the required amount.

It wasn’t a big sum that the man was asking for, although it wasn’t a small amount either. What angered him was the thought of the man yet again asking him for money. This seemed to have become a sort of regular practice. In just half a year, he had asked him for money on a number of occasions. The man’s teeth were in a bad shape, because of which he couldn’t eat properly. He had asked him for some money to get a set of false teeth, and he had sent the money gladly. Some weeks later, he had sent the man a sizeable amount to help him buy a second-hand moped, which would save him the torment of travelling all the way from his home to his workplace and back in a crowded bus (Later, he discovered that the man didn’t buy the vehicle, but he did not think it right to ask him to return the money). Some months ago, the man had messaged him that he needed to pay his daughter’s father-in-law some money that he had borrowed from him for his daughter’s marriage-related expenses. He sent the man that money, albeit not without some hesitation. And now he had received this message from the man, requesting for yet more money!

He was very irritated at this latest request. He just didn’t like being treated like an ATM machine, which he thought the man was doing! Almost as soon as he read the message he sent the man a polite but firm reply, curtly declining his plea. Having sent the message, he felt relieved. He felt good being able to say ‘No’ to the man for the first time ever.

After finishing some chores, he sat down with a cup of tea and reflected on the incident. But this time, he discovered that he didn’t feel as comfortable as he had soon after messaging the man to inform that he wouldn’t give him the money that he had asked for. He thought of the man: in his late 50s, he was a simple, kind-hearted, cheerful person, actually. He worked as a watchman in a small company in a distant city. He was his family’s sole bread-earner. They lived in a flimsy two-room structure in an overcrowded slum, and perhaps half his monthly salary went on paying rent for the place. His two daughters had recently got married, and that had drained all his savings. His son was a good-for-nothing loafer, who simply refused to get himself a job. Recently divorced, he was a cantankerous young man, angry with his parents for being poor.

As thoughts about the man swirled about in his mind, he felt a deep compassion well up inside him. He felt sad for him. How challenging his life must be! He could visualize him getting up early in the morning and boarding a crowded, ramshackle bus to arrive at his workplace on time, every single day, and it was such a monotonous, boring job that he did. He could picture him standing at the bus-stop in the evening, waiting for the bus to go back to the little tenement in the slum where he and his family lived and which they couldn’t afford to call their own. He thought of how much it must pain him to have to part with more than half his salary every month for being able to stay there. He could imagine him worrying about how his wife and he would manage when he grew so old that he could no longer work…

And then, a thought came to his mind. It suggested to him that he really ought to send the man some money—not the entire sum that he had requested for, but half. After all, it wasn’t a very large amount. But no sooner did this thought come to him than he said to himself, “I know it isn’t a big sum of money, but if I send him even half the money, he may keep asking me for money, thinking that I always agree when he asks for it. And then, this may never end! Today, he’s asked for money for his electricity bill, and tomorrow it may be for something else. How long can I keep sending him money whenever he asks for it?”

“How long, how long?” he asked himself. “Surely, this has to stop sometime!” he insisted, firmly.

But just then, his inner voice interrupted and spoke, “Think about this: Every single thing you have is not yours actually. It has been given to you by God. Has God ever tired of giving you things? Has He ever complained to you about giving you all that you need? Has God ever asked you for how long He should keep giving you food, a place to stay, money and so on? No! God keeps giving you—giving you whatever you need. He never stops! In the same way, you must keep giving—to those who genuinely need some of the things you might have that God has blessed you with—and you should never stop doing so. Keep giving, according to your capacity.”

With that, he now knew exactly what he should do. He opened his computer, logged into his online banking account and arranged for half the money that the man had requested for to be transferred to him. Along with this, he sent him a message, saying, “Brother, thanks for your message. I am sending you half the money you had asked for. I have a request, please. Could you please try to pass on the same amount of money to a needy person in the future, if and when you are able to? Thank you!”